After about two centuries of research and study, our ignorance about the climate of the ice ages, mammoths and extinctions has been elevated to substantial higher levels. Many steps have been made, but what is the right direction? However, when the collection of riddles merely increases, it could be useful to go back to the beginning and start again following new road signs, which were not available for the pioneers of the paleoclimate research.

The end of the Pleistocene Ice ages about 10,000 years ago corresponds with large-scale extinctions of mega fauna species of the Northern Hemisphere. Amongst these, woolly rhinos, mastodonts, cave bears, steppe lion but especially the woolly mammoth, with the dubious honor of being the poster child victim. Rather than over hunting, it’s the climate change, which is increasingly associated as being causal for these events. Despite its high visibility, the link with climate changes appears to be a posteriori and it’s very rare event that these animals appear in paleoclimate publications about the termination of the ice ages of the Pleistocene. We intend to rectify this omission.

The biotope of the megafauna towards the end of the last ice ages is a dry, likely cold steppe that extended over large parts of the northern hemisphere, including Europe, North Siberia, Alaska and the present United States. Rather than large temperature changes it appears that startling precipitation changes transformed the extensive mammoth steppes into marshes and swamps, completely unfit for large grazers. The demise of the biotope often implied the extinction of the species.

We attempt to replicate the dramatic event and we demonstrate that the large scale precipitation changes can be related to large shifts in oceanic flow patterns. We investigate if these could have been related to the destabilization of two huge methane hydrate fields on the ocean floor, the (double barreled) Clathrate gun. The evidence suggests that such a scenario could be feasible.

Since our hypothesis challenges current paradigms it requires a thorough analysis of weak and strong points and we encounter several contradictions and shortcomings. In short when we walk the paths again but now with mammoths on the road signs we appear to progress much further.